Google Nuking Infinite SMS App for iPhone

Michael on Facebook sent us link to this announcement on innerfence, which says Google is shutting down the Infinite SMS App.

According to the developers:

Google has claimed no grievance with Infinite SMS other than its success. Their given reason for the block isn’t abuse or wrongdoing; it’s that we brought too many users (and thus too much cost) to an experimental service.

Google’s official statement reads:

Infinite SMS is a third party app that has been using Google technology to provide free SMS for users, while we were paying for the cost of the text messages. While Google is supportive of third party apps, we've decided we can't support this particular usage of our system at this time. SMS chat is still just an experiment in the early testing stages in Gmail Labs. We're blocking all external XMPP clients from sending SMS; we're not singling out Inner Fence.

SMS, of course, uses the carrier channel to inexpensively send short 160 byte text messages which the Telco's then exorbitantly price gouge users $0.20 per message (do the math, thats thousands for megs) or offer bundled in large or unlimited numbers. They've even priced them so high for businesses that companies like Twitter -- and apparently more so Google -- can't or don't want to pay for them, especially for international users.

Are you an Infinite SMS user? If so, what are your thoughts on Innerfence, Google, experimental services, and SMS charges?